Thursday, November 24, 2011

Regular Season Game 20: Flamed Out

Instead of coming up with a summary of a game that happened last Wednesday, I'll let the pros handle it. Here is the game-in-words from the Free Press, Detroit News, and Winging it in Motown (a favorite blog of mine).

Zetterberg carries in on the zone entry. Once the PKers move towards him he passes to Filppula, who is moving low. Filppula picks it up and carries behind the net.

All of Calgary's defenders collapse on net and focus on the puck carrier. This naturally presents a great opportunity for the Wings. If Filppula can move the puck despite the forthcoming pressure, then there is going to be someone with an open shooting lane.

Filppula moves it up along the boards to Hudler, who passes to his left to Lidstrom. Calgary can't get back into their box quickly enough to alter Lids' shot in the slightest. The X in the screen cap above is where the defender should be, and you can see where he is. Holmstrom tips the shot past Kiprusoff for his second (!) goal of the season.

2nd Period:

Detroit 1 Calgary 1; 00:44- Iginla from Tanguay & Butler

Cleary falls down and loses his handle on the puck. Calgary picks it up and, with two Wings very low in the zone and another unable to catch up, find themselves on a 3-on-2 break.

Butler passes to Tanguay upon entry to Calgary's offensive zone. Lidstrom steps up and tries to poke check the puck off of Tanguay's stick but misses, allowing him to pass to his right to a wide open Jerome Iginla.

Howard tries to square himself to the shooter but still can't stop Iginla. Lidstrom attempts to get in Iginla's shooting lane but can't recover and doesn't influence the shot at all.

Detroit 1 Calgary 2; 2:56- Morrison from Jackman

Detroit loses a board battle here, as Jackman is able to tap the puck out to Morrison near Calgary's defensive blue line.

We pick this up again as Morrison crosses the blue line into the offensive zone. Kindl is the Wings' defensemen circled above, and he's not playing this correctly. There's no pass available for Morrison, but Kindl is playing this like there is. Look at the orange bar above and note how far away the Calgary trailer is.

That's a pretty telling screenshot. All alone, slapshot from the top of the faceoff circle...this is a shot that Howard should be able to stop. There's no way to sugarcoat this.

Detroit 2 Calgary 2; 7:38- White (4) from Datsyuk (12) & Franzen (11)

Detroit's had the puck for a while, and we start the sequence immediately following a shot from Franzen that is blocked by a Calgary defender. The defender tries to clear, but the puck never leaves the zone. It hits Pavel, then he's all like "Here Mule, have snack," then Mule's all like *flinch*, then Pavel's all like "Oh hey it's puck again." Pavel ends up with the puck back on his stick and, as the defense heads up ice, hits Ian White with a pass as White enters the zone.

It looks like White is going to shoot here and he sells it nicely by dragging his back foot, but instead he puck handles his way over to the boards.

Kiprusoff is off balance. At first he's screened by Detroit, and now he's being screened by his own player and is craning to try and see around him. White must notice that Kipper is vulnerable. He absolutely threads a perfect shot through the defender and past Kiprusoff.

The Wings are in the waning seconds of a powerplay. Calgary is in their box formation to defend. White moves the puck to Datsyuk along the sideboards, and Franzen cuts to the slot.

Take a look at Calgary's box. That's the Mule caught in the middle of it. Now look below the box, in front of the goaltender. Take one guess where Pavel's about to pass or shoot. Hint: it's not into the middle of the box.

Holmstrom sweeps the puck around Kiprusoff and takes some punishment (as per usual) in the process.

Detroit 3 Calgary 3; 5:06- PPG Jokinen from Brodie & Bouwmeester

Calgary is on the power play here. The puck is along the side boards, where Helm is in a puck battle with Jokinen. As he spins, Jokinen strips Helm of his stick. This is highlighted above and will come back to hurt Helm later.

Calgary does a good job of moving the puck and keeping the Wings off balance. The pass has just come from the point to the left faceoff circle, and the Wings defense is still adjusting to the movement.

Brodie passes through the slot to Jokinen. Helm (circled in red above) can't do anything to take away the passing lane because he doesn't have a freaking stick fergodsakes. Sure, it'd be nice if Brodie's passing lane could be taken away by one of the defenders closer to him but Helm's lack of graphite plays an unfortunate role here. Jimmy has already gone into the butterfly, and there's almost no chance he can get across the crease to stop the one timer from Jokinen.

It's hard to beak down a goal that's a fluke, but I'll take the lack of breakdown in exchange for a go-ahead goal in the third period any day. The Wings have a 5-on-3 advantage, and they're moving the puck around well. Lidstrom ends up with it at the point and passes to Datsyuk, who carries it low into the zone. Datsyuk throws a shot/pass (hard to tell what his intent was, but Homer is in front of the net) that hits Bouwmeester in the skate and bounces past Kiprusoff.

Detroit 5 Calgary 3; 13:53- Filppula (4) from Hudler (8) & White (6)

Technically the Wings powerplay expired as I took that screencap, but take one look at the defense and you can see it's basically still a powerplay. Hudler is running the point and has no lane to put a shot on net. Calgary's defenders did a good job of taking away the shooting lane, but there's a passing lane to Hudler's left. He moves the puck to Filppula in the faceoff circle.

Fil fakes hard to his left, then pulls the puck back across his body and goes to the backhand. Kiprusoff is leaning to his right, trying to see past the screen. Filppula shoots top corner off the backhand, Kiprusoff can't recover, and the Wings win it.

About Me

Adam is a U of M grad who learned how to hold a hockey stick from watching Fedorov and the Wings on their '97 Cup run. He hasn't looked back since. Or skated, but that's beside the point. His ultimate goal is to provide the most thorough goal-by-goal and statistical analysis of Red Wings hockey on the internet. Follow the blog on Twitter @TOGBlog1